Coming Home
by just-nikki
Summary: "The new words felt familiar in his mouth. Like coming home." In which Reid gets hurt, Morgan can't figure out what to say, and everyone leaves happy. Moreid.


Morgan's footsteps echoed in an uncomfortably familiar way as he made his way down the terrazzo lined hall.

He had been here too often.

The smell of antiseptic, the feeling of his heart beating painfully against his ribs, the hum of the activity around him buzzing in his ears, those things were always the same. But somehow every time it felt like the first time he'd ever had to do this. So familiar and so new simultaneously.

He knew exactly what he would see when he turned the corner into the small, white room, but it knocked the air out of his lungs anyway.

The sight of Spencer Reid in a hospital bed was not something he was about to get used to.

Reid was sitting up in his bed, surrounded by the rest of the team. He was pale, more so than usual, but smiling. His head turned when Morgan entered the room and he bit his bottom lip before quickly looking back to Garcia.

Prentiss followed Reid's eyes and turned towards the door. "Morgan, thank goodness. They brought more jello than Reid can possibly eat."

"Come have a seat," Garcia said, motioning Morgan in.

"Actually," Morgan said in a quiet, measured voice. "If you all wouldn't mind, I'd like some privacy." His expression was unreadable, which said everything the team needed to know. With quick glances to one another, they headed for the door without a word.

Morgan's eyes never left Reid, who had yet to make eye contact with him. He stepped into the room and stood a few feet away from the bed. His gaze moved from Reid's uneasy posture to the gauze covering his shoulder and he shook his head, unable to articulate everything he was thinking.

"I took a calculated risk," Reid said before Morgan could say anything.

Immediately, Morgan's heart started to beat faster. He slowly clenched his hands into fists and flexed his fingers.

"You could have gotten yourself killed." Morgan's voice stayed calm even as he felt anything but. He glared at the blank wall behind Reid's bed as though it had caused him personal harm.

The bed creaked as Reid shifted uncomfortably. He rubbed where his left shoulder was wrapped in bandages. "I'm fine, Morgan," he said the next time Morgan's eyes found his.

Morgan moved closer until he was beside the bed. He reached a hand out and ran a finger along the bandage. "This is fine to you? Fine landed you in the hospital. You know who gets called first when you get shot in the field? Your emergency contact. Me. That's the fucking message I got to hear when I finished interviews at the prison, so excuse me if this doesn't seem fine to me."

Reid started to open his mouth to speak, but Morgan held up his hand and shook his head.

"Don't. I know what you're going to say and I don't want to hear it. You don't believe it anymore than I do." Morgan turned around and walked over to the window. He couldn't look at Reid and tell him the things he needed to say.

"You could have died. And then what am I supposed to do, kid?" He ran a hand over his head. "What am I supposed to do without you?" he added so softly Reid hardly heard him.

Morgan looked up at the plain ceiling tiles and blinked a few times.

"Morgan…" Reid said softly. He reached a hand out towards him. "I'm going to be okay. I'll be out of the hospital tomorrow and back to work next week."

The room felt unbearably small now. It was filled with too many unspoken words to let Morgan breathe comfortably. He rubbed the back of his neck before he finally turned around to face Reid. Every muscle in his body felt tense, every nerve raw, but the look on Reid's face softened every harsh feeling left in his grasp.

"I can't justify the decision we- I- made to go into the house. It was calculated, it did seem like the right call, but in hindsight it was stupid not to wait for backup. I know it could have ended a lot worse than me with a minor gunshot wound. It's a graze, really, I lost maybe a pint of blood, which is basically your standard blood donation. Not that you needed to know that or that that's helpful at all, I mean, I'm just trying to say that whatever else you want to say, I deserve it. I put myself in unnecessary danger and I didn't consider what that would mean for you and I'm sorry," Reid spilled out in a jumble. "Go ahead," he prompted after a beat of silence.

Morgan opened his mouth, his tongue already heavy with words, everything he hadn't yet said that he needed Reid to understand. But there was Reid, sitting there in front of him in a hospital gown, looking exhausted, waiting expectantly for whatever it was Morgan wanted to say. There was Reid, wrapped in bandages and gauze, certainly in pain and certainly declining painkillers, and Morgan found there was only one thing left he needed Reid to know.

He crossed the room in two strides and took Reid's face in his hands, letting his thumbs stroke Reid's cheekbones.

"I love you."

The new words felt familiar in his mouth, like coming home.

Reid's eyes widened. "Oh."

For the first time in hours, Morgan's lips twitched upward.

"Is that all you have to say, pretty boy?" he asked softly, teasingly, trying to conceal how hard his heart was thumping against his ribs.

But Reid just smiled, and his shoulders relaxed from where he'd been holding them stiffly around his ears. He reached up to Morgan with his right hand and clasped a handful of the soft fabric of Morgan's shirt and tugged him in until he was close enough to kiss. With their lips a hair's breadth apart, Reid hesitated for just a second.

"I love you too," he said before they closed the distance, their lips soft and smiling. Morgan had never wanted Reid more than in this moment, the sensation of nearly losing him had every nerve in his body on fire, but Reid's labored breathing forced him to pull back. He did so slowly, like it was agonizing to put even inches between their bodies, which was not helped when Reid nibbled enticingly at Morgan's bottom lip before he could stand up completely.

"You know, kissing causes blood vessels to dilate and allows the brain to receive more oxygen, which some studies suggest may boost the healing process so by not kissing me, you could actually be impeding my recovery."

Morgan leaned back over the smaller man, grinning. "Is that so?"

"Yes," Reid said. "There's actually a few studies that refute the correlation but I don't think I should bring that up," he paused. "It just seems academically disingenuous to not mention it since you haven't read the research and are just listening to what I tell you."

Now it was Morgan's turn to pause. He pulled Reid's blankets up from where they lay in a puddle around his waist and waited for Reid to lie back against his pillows. Morgan could feel Reid's eyes watching him even as he shifted around on the pillows, trying to find a comfortable position.

"Tell you what, kid. Get well enough to go home tomorrow and we can do our own study," he said before resting his hand on Reid's cheek and kissing his forehead.

Reid closed his eyes and leaned into Morgan's touch, wanting him to linger.

"It would be a flawed study if we were the only subjects," he said, his eyes still closed.

Morgan pulled a chair up close to Reid's bed and sat, taking Reid's hand in his. He stroked his thumb over the pale skin. The only sound in the room was the steady hum of the medical equipment, a reassuringly strong beat that matched the pulse Morgan could feel under his fingers. He tried to think about how close he'd come to losing this. Lucky, the doctor on the phone had said. Only a few more inches the other direction and it's not the hospital Morgan would be sitting in. Just how incredibly dumb this had been was still a conversation Morgan wanted to have but…

He watched the steady rise and fall of Reid's chest and felt how tightly he held onto Morgan's hand, even in sleep. Like it was a lifeline.

That conversation could wait for another day.


End file.
